Paul Starr

PUBLICATIONS Books Articles Reviews Columns, op-eds, and other items Congressional testimony

BOOKS

• Freedom's Power: The History and Promise of Liberalism (Basic Books, August 2008), revised paperback; originally published in 2007 with subtitle The True Force of Liberalism.
• The Creation of the Media: Political Origins of Modern Communications (Basic Books, 2004). Goldsmith Book Prize.
• The Logic of Health-Care Reform, orig. ed. (Grand Rounds Press, 1992). For high-resolution PDF, click here. Revised and enlarged edition (Penguin, 1994); Introduction to the Penguin Edition
• The Politics of Numbers (Russell Sage, 1987), edited with William Alonso.
• The Social Transformation of American Medicine (Basic Books, 1982 [actually published in January 1983]). 1984 Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction; Bancroft Prize in American History, C. Wright Mills Award of the Society for the Social Problems, and James Hamilton Prize of the American College of Health Care Executives.
• The Discarded Army: Veterans After Vietnam (Charterhouse, 1974), assisted by James Henry and Raymond Bonner. Introduction by Ralph Nader.
• The University Crisis Reader, 2 vols., edited with Immanuel Wallerstein (Random House, 1971).
• Up Against the Ivy Wall, with Jerry Avorn and others(Atheneum, 1968).

ARTICLES

• "Dodging a Bullet: Democracy’s Gains in Modern War," in Elizabeth Kier and Ronald R. Krebs, eds., In War’s Wake: International Conflict and the Fate of Liberal Democracy (forthcoming).
• "Goodbye to the Age of Newspapers (Hello to a New Era of Corruption)" The New Republic, March 4, 2009, 28-35.
  
• "Democratic Theory and the History of Communications," in Barbie Zelizer, ed., Explorations in Communications and History (Routledge, 2008), 34-44.
• "A New Deal of Their Own" The American Prospect (March 2008), A6-7.
  
• "The Democrats' Strategic Challenge" The American Prospect (January-February 2008), 12-15.
  
• "The Hillarycare Mythology" The American Prospect (October 2007), 12-18.
  
• "Why Liberalism Works" The American Prospect (April 2007), 34-40.
  
• "War and Liberalism," The New Republic, March 5 and 12, 2007.
  
• “Social Transformation Twenty Years On,” in “Transforming American Medicine: A Twenty-Year Retrospective on The Social Transformation of American Medicine, ed. by Keith Wailoo, Timothy Stoltzfus Jost, and Mark Schlesinger, Journal of Health Policy, Politics, and Law 29 (4/5, 2004), 1005-1019. [Note: my essay is a response to the 19 papers in the volume.]
• “Health Care’s Big Choice,” The American Prospect 10 (October 2004), 30-33.
• “The Great Telecom Implosion,” The American Prospect (September 9, 2002), 20-24.
• “Health Care Reform and the New Economy,” Health Affairs 19 (November-December 2000), 23-32.
• “The Electronic Commons,” The American Prospect (March 27-April 10, 2000), 30-34.
• "Health and the Right to Privacy,"American Journal of Law and Medicine 25 (1999), 193-202.
• "An Emerging Democratic Majority," The American Prospect no. 35 (November-December 1997): 18-27. Adapted and reprinted from Stanley Greenberg and Theda Skocpol, eds., The New Majority (Yale University Press, 1997).
• "Smart Technology, Stunted Policy: Developing Health Information Networks," Health Affairs 15 (May-Jun 1997), 91-105.
• "Computing Our Way to Educational Reform," The American Prospect no. 27 (July-August 1996): 50-59. Reprinted in the Journal of Mediated Communication 11 (December 1996), 1-17.
• "Reinventing Vital Statistics: The Impact of Changes in Information Technology, Welfare Policy, and Health Care," Public Health Reports 110 (September/October 1995): 534-544.
• "What Happened to Health Care Reform?" The American Prospect no. 20 (Winter 1995): 20-31.
• "Seductions of Sim: Policy as a Simulation Game," The American Prospect no. 17 (Spring 1994): 19-29.
• "Delivering Health Reform," The American Prospect, no. 16 (Winter 1994): 32-41.
• "For the Clinton Plan," The New Republic (December 6, 1993): 28-31.
• "The Framework of Health Care Reform," New England Journal of Medicine 329 (November 25, 1993): 1666-1672.
• "Bridge to Compromise: Competition Under a Budget," Health Affairs (Supplement 1993): 7-23 [with Walter A. Zelman].
• "Design of Health Insurance Purchasing Cooperatives," Health Affairs (Supplement 1993): 58-64.
• "Healthy Compromise: Universal Coverage and Managed Competition Under a Cap," The American Prospect No. 12 (Winter 1993): 44-52.
• "The Middle Class and National Health Reform," The American Prospect No. 6 (Summer 1991): 7-12.
• "The Politics of Health Care Inequalities," in David E. Rogers and Eli Ginzberg, eds., Medical Care and the Health of the Poor (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1993), 21-32.
• "A New Deal for the Young,” in Paul N. Van de Water and Lisbeth B. Schorr, eds, Security for America's Children: Proceedings of the Fourth Conference of the National Academy of Social Insurance (Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt Publishing Company 1993).
• "Social Categories and Claims in the Liberal State," Social Research 59 (Summer 1992): 263-95; different version published in Mary Douglas and David Hull, eds., How Classification Works: Nelson Goodman Among the Social Sciences (Edinburgh University Press, 1992), 154-79.
• "Liberalism After Socialism," The American Prospect, no. 7 (Fall 1991): 70-80.
• "Can Government Work?" The American Prospect no. 2 (Summer 1990): 38-50; reprinted in John F. Sears, ed., Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Future of Liberalism (Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute/Meckler, 1991), 95-108.
• "The New Life of the Liberal State: Privatization and the Restructuring of State-Society Relations" in John Waterbury and Ezra Suleiman, eds., Public Enterprise and Privatization (Westview, 1990), 22-54.
• “The Meaning of Privatization," Yale Law and Policy Review 6 (1988): 6-41. Reprinted in Alfred Kahn and Sheila Kamerman, eds., Privatization and the Welfare State (Princeton University Press, 1989).
• "Social Security and the American Public Household," in Theodore Marmor and Jerry L. Mashaw, eds., Social Security: Beyond the Rhetoric of Crisis (Princeton University Press, 1988), 119-48.
• "The Limits of Privatization," in Steve Hanke, ed., Prospects for Privatization (Academy of Political Science, 1987): 124-137. Reprinted in Dennis J. Gayle and Jonathan N. Goodrich, eds. Privatization and Deregulation in Global Perspective (Quorum, 1990). Reprinted in a revised and expanded form as a report of the Economic Policy Institute, Washington, D.C, 1988.
• "Health Care and the Boundaries of Politics," with Ellen Immergut, in Charles Maier, ed., The Changing Boundaries of the Political (Cambridge University Press, 1987), 221-254.
• "The Sociology of Official Statistics," in Alonso and Starr, eds., The Politics of Numbers, 7-57.
• "Who Will Have the Numbers? The Rise of the Statistical Services Industry and the Politics of Public Data," with Ross Corson, in Alonso and Starr, eds., The Politics of Numbers, 415-447.
• "Health Care for the Poor: The Past Twenty Years," in Sheldon Danziger and Daniel Weinberg, eds., Fighting Poverty: What Works and What Doesn't (Harvard University Press, 1986), 106-32.
• "The United States: A Social Forcast" (with Theodore Marmor) in Jean de Kervasdoue, et al., eds., The End of an Illusion: The Future of Health Policy in Western Industrialized Nations (University of California Press, 1985).
• "The Laissez-Faire Elixir," The New Republic, April 18, 1983.
• "Medical Care and the Pursuit of Equality in America," in President's Commission for the Study of Ethical Problems in Medicine and Biomedical and Behavioral Research, Securing Access to Health Care, v. 2, Appendices, 2-22.
• "The Electronic Reader," Daedalus 112 (Winter 1983): 143-56.
• "Evolution in Defeat: The Changing Objective of National Health Insurance, 1915-1980," American Journal of Public Health 72 (January 1982): 78-88.
• "The Phantom Community," in John Case and Rosemary Taylor, eds., Co-ops, Communes and Collectives: Social Experiments from the 1960s and 1970s (Pantheon, 1979.
• "Passive Intervention," Working Papers for a New Society, July/August, 1979, with Gosta Esping-Andersen.
• "Medicine and the Waning of Professional Sovereignty," Daedalus, Winter 1978.
• "Medicine, Economy and Society in Nineteenth-Century America," Journal of Social History, Summer 1977.
• "The Politics of Therapeutic Nihilism," Working Papers for a New Society, Summer 1976; reprinted in the Hastings Center Report, October 1976.
• "The Undelivered Health System," The Public Interest, Winter 1976.
• "Politics Against Government," The New Republic, December 27, 1975.
• "The Doctors' Discomfort," The New Republic, June 10, 1975.
• "The New Medicine," The New Republic, April 19, 1975.
• "A National Health Program: Organizing Diversity," Hastings Center Report, February 1975.
• "The Edge of Social Science," Harvard Educational Review 44 (November 1974): 393-415.
• "Transforming the Libraries," Change, November 1974.

REVIEWS

• "Welcome to the Party," The New Republic, Nov. 19, 2008, 39-42. Review of Nancy Rosenblum's On the Side of the Angels: An Appreciation of Parties and Partisanship.
• “Freedom's Future Online," The American Prospect (July-August, 2008), 38-41. Review of The Future of the Internet and How to Stop It by Jonathan Zittrain.
• "The Return of the Nativist" The New Republic June 21, 2004, 25-28. [on Samuel Huntington's Who Are We?]
• Review of Jason DeParle, American Dream, The New York Times, Nov. 3, 2004, E8.
• “Women’s Work,” The New York Times Book Review (February 11, 2001), 10. [On Ann Crittenden's The Price of Motherhood.]
• “The Public Vanishes,” The New Republic (August 14, 2000), 35-37 [On Robert Putnam's Bowling Alone.]
• "Scored for Life," The New Republic November 29, 1999.[On Nicholas Lemann's The Big Test: The Secret History of the American Meritocracy.]
• Review of Theda Skocpol's Boomerang: Clinton's Health Security Effort and the Turn Against Government in U.S. Politics,Contemporary Sociology(March-April 1997):150-153.
• "Nothing Neo," The New Republic (December 4, 1995), 35-38.[On Irving Kristol's Neoconservatism: The Autobiography of an Idea.]
• Review of Annalee Saxenian, Regional Advantage: Culture and Competition in Silicon Valley and Route 128 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994), in Contemporary Sociology (May 1995).
• "Revel Without a Cause," The New Republic, February 3,1992.[On Jean-Francois Revel's The Flight From Truth.]
• "Good Offices," The New Republic, July 23, 1990.[On James Q. Wilson's Bureaucracy.]
• "The Price of Pessimism," The New Republic, January 23, 1989. [On Nathan Glazer's The Limits of Social Policy.]
• "Losing More Ground," The New Republic, December 5, 1988. [On Charles Murray's In Pursuit.]
• Review of Robert Jay Lifton, The Nazi Doctors, in The New Republic, November 24, 1986.
• Review of Patricia Cline Cohen, A Calculating People: The Rise of Numeracy in Early America, in The New Republic, February 13, 1984.
• Review of Bruce Vladeck, Unloving Care: The Nursing Home Tragedy, in The New York Times Book Review, April 16, 1980.
• Review of William J. Wilson, The Declining Significance of Race and Dorothy K. Newman, et al., Protest, Politics and Prosperity in The New York Times Book Review, January 7, 1979.
• "Hollywood's New Ideal of Masculinity," The New York Times (Sunday Arts & Leisure), July 16, 1978.
• "The Helpers and the Renegades" The New York Times Book Review, May 21, 1978. [On Willard Gaylin et al.'s Doing Good).
• "How They Fail" Working Papers for a New Society, March/April 1978. [On Frances Fox Piven and Richard A. Cloward's Poor People's Movements: Why They Succeed, How They Fail.]
• Review of Robert Coles, Children of Crisis, vols. 4 and 5, The New York Times Book Review, January 22, 1978.
• Review of Godfrey Hodgson, America in Our Time and Morris Dickstein, Gates of Eden, in The New Republic, May 24, 1977.
• Review of Robert Nisbet, Sociology as an Art Form, in The New York Times Book Review, October 31, 1976.
• Review of Roberto Unger, Knowledge and Politics, in The New Republic, March 20, 1976.
• Review of Kirkpatrick Sale, Power Shift, in The New Republic, December 13, 1975.
• Review of Charles Kadushin, The American Intellectual Elite, in The New York Times Book Review, September 15, 1974.
• Review of Alvin Gouldner, For Sociology, in The New York Times Book Review, February 2, 1974.
• Review of Michael Young and Peter Wilmott, The Symmetrical Family, in The New York Times Book Review, February 3, 1974.
• Review of Robert Jay Lifton, Home From the War, in Worldview, October 1973.

COLUMNS, OP-EDS, AND OTHER ITEMS

2009

• "Are We on Track for a Golden Age of Serious Journalism?" A debate with Steven Johnson. Prospect Magazine [U.K.], May 2009.
  
• "Revolution Amid Recession" The American Prospect (May 2009), 3.
  

  2008

• "The American Collision"The American Prospect(October 2008), 3. PDF
  
• "The Year of Passion"The American Prospect(July-August 2008), 3. PDF
  
• "Lullaby of Baghdad"The American Prospect(May 2008), 3.
  
• "Bringing the Race to Closure"The American Prospect(July-August 2008), 3. PDF
  
• "Watch It, Democrats. You Could Still Slip Up," Washington Post, January 20, 2008.
  

  2007

• "Hold That Tax" The American Prospect (December 2007), 3.
  
• "Iraq Trap 2" The American Prospect (October 2007), 3.
  
• "Why Immigration Reform Matters" The American Prospect (July-August 2007), 3.
  
• "Is Rising Inequality Reversible?" The American Prospect (May 2007), 3.
  
• "Congressional Battleground" The American Prospect (March 2007), 3.
  
• "The Way Out" The American Prospect (January-February 2007), 3.
  

  2006

• "Pyongyang Boomerang," The American Prospect (November 2006)
  
• "Rendezvous with Failure," The American Prospect (September 2006)
  
• "Next Stop Iran?" The American Prospect (May 2006)
  
• "Bush v. Constitution" The American Prospect (March 2006)
  
• "Starting Over," The American Prospect (January 2006)
  

  2005

• "Slouching Toward Disaster," The American Prospect (November 2005)
  
• "Letting Go of Iraq," The American Prospect (September 2005)
  
• "End of the Private New Deal," The American Prospect (July 2005)
  
• "The Price of a Free Society," The American Prospect (May 2005)
  
• "Political Networking," Technology Review, April 2005.
• "Their Sun Also Rises," The American Prospect (April 2005)
• "The Liberal Uses of Power" [with Michael Tomasky and Robert Kuttner], The American Prospect (March 2005).
• "Why We Need Social Security," The American Prospect (February 2005).
• "Winning Cases, Losing Voters," The New York Times, January 26, 2005.
• "Security Flaws," The American Prospect (January 2005).

  2004

• "Morals of the Election” The American Prospect (December 2004).
• “A World Apart” The American Prospect (November 2004).
• "Liberalism in Arms” The American Prospect (September 2004).
• “The Return of Energy” The American Prospect (August 2004).
• “Check and Balance” The American Prospect (July 2004).
• "The Meaning of Abu Ghraib” The American Prospect (June 2004).
• “Step Back” The American Prospect (May 2004).
• “Reclaiming the Air,” The American Prospect 15 (March 2004), 57-60.
• "Judicial Overreach” The American Prospect (March 2004).
• “The Republican Lock” The American Prospect (February 2004);
• “The New Politics of Medicare” The American Prospect (January 2004);

  2003

• "The President’s New Crusade” The American Prospect (December 2003).
• “The Democrats’ Military Option” The American Prospect (October 2003).
• “Elections as an Exit Strategy” The American Prospect (September 2003).
• “Will Bush Pay for Deception?” The American Prospect (July/August 2003).
• “The Bush Bankruptcy Plan," The American Prospect (June 2003).
• “A License for Power,” The American Prospect (May 2003).
• “A War for Democracy?” The American Prospect (April 2003).
• "The Easy War” The American Prospect (March 2003).

  2002

• “The Repudiation Syndrome,” The American Prospect (November 18, 2002) [reprinted in Washington Post].
• "No Choice but War?” The American Prospect (October 7, 2002).
• “9-11, One Year Later,” The American Prospect (September 23, 2002).
• “How Bushes Get Beaten,” The American Prospect (July 23, 2002).
• “The New Politics of Diversity," The American Prospect (June 17, 2002).
• "Catholic Crisis, Jewish Nightmare,” The American Prospect (May 20, 2002).
• “Peace by Other Means,” The American Prospect (May 6, 2002).
• “The Democrats’ Energy Problem,” The American Prospect (March 11, 2002).
• “Rethinking the Unthinkable,” The American Prospect (April 8, 2002).
• “Liberty Since 9-11,” The American Prospect (January 28, 2002). [Reprinted as “American Presidents and Civil Liberties,” in Danny Goldberg et al., eds., It’s a Free Country (New York: RDV Books, 2002), 28-31.]

  2001

• "Airpower and Our Power," The American Prospect (December 17, 2001).
• "The War about the War," The American Prospect (November 19, 2001).
• "The War We Should Fight," The American Prospect (October 22, 2001).
• "What Killed the Boom?" The American Prospect (September 10, 2001).
• "A Believable Politics," The American Prospect (August 13, 2001).
• "Failure to Convert," The American Prospect (July 2-16, 2001).
• "Parodies Lost," The American Prospect (June 4, 2001).
• "A Reform That Doesn’t," The American Prospect (May 7, 2001).
• "The Executive-Class President," The American Prospect (April 9, 2001).
• "Mr. Bush Gets His Honeymoon," The American Prospect (February 26, 2001).
• "Bush's Luck, Clinton's Dilemma," The American Prospect (January 29, 2001).
• "The Betrayal," The American Prospect (January 1-15, 2001).

  2000

• “The Morning After” The American Prospect (December 4, 2000), 4.
• “War, Peace and the Election,”The American Prospect (November 20, 2000), 5.
• “Squeak or Sweep?” The American Prospect (November 6, 2000) 6;
• “Why I’m Not a Populist,” The American Prospect (September 25-October 9, 2000) 6.
• “Liberalism After Clinton,” The American Prospect (August 28, 2000).
• “Thy Kingdom Dot Com,” The American Prospect 6-7.
• “Reckless Predictions,” The American Prospect (March 13, 2000), 6-7.
• "The Defining Issue," The American Prospect, v. 11, no. 7 (February 14, 2000), 6-7.
• "The Perils of High-Mindedness," The American Prospect, v. 11, no. 5 (January 17, 2000), 6-7.

  1999

• "What You Need to Beat Goliath," The American Prospect, v. 11, no. 3 (December 20, 1999), 7-9.
• "America’s Parliamentary Election," The American Prospect, v. 11, no. 1 (November 23, 1999), 8-10.
• "The Return of Health Reform," originally in Washington Post (October 17, 1999).
• "The Choice in Kosovo," The American Prospect, no. 45 (July-August 1999): 6-9.
• “The Storm Amid the Calm,” The American Prospect no. 43 (March-April 1999): 6?8.

  1998

• "The American Recovery," The American Prospect no. 39 (July-August 1998): 6-9.
• "The Homeless and the Public Household," The New England Journal of Medicine 338 (June 11, 1998).
• "The Legacy of Three Gambles,"The New Democrat (January-February 1998).
• "The Loophole We Can't Close," The American Prospect no. 35 (January-February 1998): 6-9.

  1997

• “Cyberpower and Freedom," The American Prospect no. 33 (July-August 1997): 6-9.
• "Democracy v. Dollar," The American Prospect, no. 31 (March-April 1997), 6-9.
• "The Clinton Presidency, Take Three," The American Prospect no. 30 (January-February 1997): 6-11.

  1996

• "Twice Bitten," Hospitals and Health Networks, November 20, 1996.
• "Damage Report," The American Prospect no. 28 (September-October 1996): 6-10.
• "Restoration Fever," The American Prospect no. 25 (March-April 1996): 6-11.

  1995

• "Between a Swing and a Lock," The American Prospect Fall 1995, No. 23, 6-9.
• "Look Who's Talking Health Care Reform Now," New York Times Magazine, September 3, 1995. pp. 42- 43.
• "Who Owns the Future?" The American Prospect Spring 1995, No. 21, 6-10.
• "Rebuilding Black Institutions," The New Democrat, May/June 1995, 26-27.
• "Foundations and the Internet," Chronicle of Philanthropy, February 8, 1995.
• "State of the Union? Someday, Paralyzed," The New York Times, January 24, 1995.

  1994

• "The Disengaged," The American Prospect, Fall 1994, No. 19, 7-8.
• "Reform is Dead. Long Live Reform," The New York Times (Sunday op-ed), September 4, 1994.
• "Why the Clinton Plan Is Not the Enthoven Plan," Inquiry 31 (Summer 1994): 136-140.
• "The Undertow," The American Prospect, Summer 1994, No. 18, 6-9.
• "Alliances for Progress," The New York Times (Sunday op-ed), March 6, 1994.

  1993 and earlier

• "Health Alliances are a Good Choice," Chicago Tribune, December 7, 1993.
• "Detoxifying the Debate," The American Prospect No. 13 (Spring 1993): 122-126.
• "Passion, Memory, and Politics, 1992," The American Prospect No. 11 (Fall 1992): 9-11.
• "The Deadly Marathon," The American Prospect No. 10 (Summer 1992): 7-10.
• "An Electoral Fantasy," The Washington Post, May 12, 1992.
• "Civil Reconstruction: What to Do Without Affirmative Action," The American Prospect no. 8 (Winter 1992): 8-14; condensed and revised version published as "Race and Reparations," The Washington Post, April 19, 1992.
• "The Ideological War Over Health Care," The New York Times, February 2 (?), 1992.
• "No Vietnam: The Liberal Case for War," The New Republic (February 19, 1991).
• "The Cultural Enemy Within," The American Prospect, no. 4 (Winter 1991): 9-11.
• "The American '80's" (contribution to a symposium),Commentary, September 1990.
• "Privatization: The Case for Skepticism," in William Gormley, ed., Privatization and its Alternatives (University of Wisconsin Press, 1990), 25-36.
• "A World Unlocked," The American Prospect No. 1 (Spring 1990): 7-9.
• "Double Binds and Double Standards," Health Management Quarterly (1989) 11: 19-24.
• "Commencement Address," Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine, March 1986; given at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, June 4, 1985.
• "A Nation of Numbers Watchers," Wilson Quarterly, Summer 1985, with William Alonso.
• "The Political Economy of National Statistics," Items, Bulletin of the Social Science Research Council (September 1982), with William Alonso.
• Comment ("On the Origins and Cure of Warped Incentives") in Mancur Olson, ed., A New Approach to the Economics of Health Care (American Enterprise Institute for Policy Research, 1981).
• "Throwing Symbols at Problems," Working Papers for a New Society, May/June 1980.
• "Changing the Balance of Power in American Medicine," Health and Society (Milbank Memorial Quarterly), January 1980.
• "Kennedy's Conservative Health Plan," The New Republic, June 9, 1979.
• "Controlling Medical Costs Through Countervailing Power," Working Papers for a New Society, Summer 1977.
• "A Coming Doctor Surplus?" Working Papers for a New Society, Winter 1977, reprinted in the Washington Post and other papers.
• "Social Policy," New Society (London), June 17, 1976.
• "Rebels After the Cause--Living with Contradictions," The New York Times Magazine, October 16, 1974.

CONGRESSIONAL TESTIMONY